José Andrés Tiny Nevada Restaurant Is Hidden In Plain Sight

Some small bars and restaurants are deliberately difficult to find. Manhattan's PDT is hidden behind a hot dog shop. The 16-seat Cavern Grotto in Arizona (scheduled to reopen February 2025) is located deep underground inside the Grand Canyon Caverns. But one of the most in-demand seats in the country is located around a small horseshoe-shaped bar in the middle of a bustling Las Vegas resort. Walking past, you wouldn't even know that é by José Andrés is its own restaurant. Located inside the much larger Jaleo by José Andrés, it looks more like just another semi-private room, set off from the main restaurant by a glass door (you may know Andrés as the force behind the global food charity World Central Kitchen).

Instead, what you'll experience, assuming you can snag a reservation, is a unique multi-course tasting menu featuring Spanish avant-garde dishes like jamón Ibérico "tacos" filled with caviar, or an elegant Spanish "pizza" slice made from Basque cheese and topped with edible flowers. In some ways, the experience is as much your evening's entertainment as it is dinner. In fact, the restaurant calls each night's seating a "show."

Both Jaleo and é opened at the end of 2010 alongside the opening of the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, and é shows no signs of slowing down. Reservations can be made up to three months in advance. As each month becomes available, it's quickly snapped up (that said, keep an eye out for cancellations). Walk through the bigger, busier Jaleo and pass into é to find the vibrant and eclectically decorated room featuring a bright red wall on one side and a sparkling black floor.

The restaurant seats up to nine people, twice each night. This cadre of diners sit at a golden counter catered to by a half-dozen staff, including a dedicated sommelier, and often executive chef Eric Suniga. Dinner will set you back $490 per person, with beverage pairings running an additional $150 to $600 (you might ask if Andrés' ultimate gin & tonic is available). As you work your way through anywhere from 20 to 25 small courses, expect to ask questions and interact continuously with the staff.

This isn't the only hidden or semi-hidden project from Andrés and his team. In 2003, he opened the Washington D.C. destination minibar, a 12-seat chef's counter alongside the cocktail lounge barmini, featuring a full multi-course dinner for $350 per person. And in 2021, in Chicago, he opened a speakeasy-style cocktail bar named Pigtail beneath that city's outpost of Jaleo.